Post by Chips on May 28, 2008 9:46:54 GMT 9.5
Under the pump to fix petrol price problem
The furore over rising petrol prices is an exercise in denial. Oil is a finite resource for which global demand is skyrocketing. We would be better served if politicians told us the truth: the days of cheap petrol are over and we must adapt to survive.
Reducing the price at the pump does not encourage motorists or manufacturers to move to smaller cars. Big problems need big thinking, not short-term populist appeals to irrationality. Improving access to public transport would eventually ease the pain far more than a few cents off today's petrol price. There could be no better way to invest the federal infrastructure fund.
Amy Wood Wagga Wagga
For years we have been paying about half what Britain and the rest of Europe pay for petrol. People in this city drive to excess and the rising price simply reflects that the status quo is unsustainable. I sympathise with people who have large families and live in western Sydney, where politicians have failed to provide adequate public transport. But they should be beating down the door of their MPs to provide the rail infrastructure that would resolve this mess. People in the eastern suburbs and the Lower North Shore should stop whingeing about petrol prices and the traffic. You are the traffic.
Kate Read Camperdown
In the future we could all be driving diesel or diesel-electric hybrid cars. This is why some of the major oil companies are putting millions of dollars into perfecting the growth of algae from which biodiesel can be extracted.
What is our Government doing about this cutting-edge technology? Judging by this month's budget, nothing. We have the CO2 (from wellhead natural gas), sunshine, land area and scientists to research and apply this technology at sites such as the north-west shelf in Western Australia.
The technology does not require good agricultural land or irrigation water, and uses up some CO2. If the Government committed to its development, we could have another export industry to rival the minerals boom, and Australia would be self-sufficient in diesel fuel.
Ian Nicholls Baulkham Hills
No one seems to have done their sums on fuel-price relief. The average car travels 25,000 kilometres a year, using about 3000 litres of fuel. A cut of five cents a litre saves $150 a year. Do Brendan Nelson and Kevin Rudd honestly believe this is going to make a difference to hard-pressed families?
Bruce Ryan Armidale
Reducing the price of petrol by a few cents a litre will release more cash into the economy and put more pressure on the Reserve Bank to raise interest rates. That puts more pressure on "working families", who are the ones most likely to be struggling with large home loans.
Robert Rochlin Riverview
Brendan Nelson claims the Coalition stands for lower petrol prices. According to the oil economist Mamdouh Salameh, who advises the World Bank and United Nations Industrial Development Organisation, the invasion of Iraq has trebled the oil price. Maybe Dr Nelson can equate this claim with Coalition policy.
Ian Ford Northbridge
The furore over rising petrol prices is an exercise in denial. Oil is a finite resource for which global demand is skyrocketing. We would be better served if politicians told us the truth: the days of cheap petrol are over and we must adapt to survive.
Reducing the price at the pump does not encourage motorists or manufacturers to move to smaller cars. Big problems need big thinking, not short-term populist appeals to irrationality. Improving access to public transport would eventually ease the pain far more than a few cents off today's petrol price. There could be no better way to invest the federal infrastructure fund.
Amy Wood Wagga Wagga
For years we have been paying about half what Britain and the rest of Europe pay for petrol. People in this city drive to excess and the rising price simply reflects that the status quo is unsustainable. I sympathise with people who have large families and live in western Sydney, where politicians have failed to provide adequate public transport. But they should be beating down the door of their MPs to provide the rail infrastructure that would resolve this mess. People in the eastern suburbs and the Lower North Shore should stop whingeing about petrol prices and the traffic. You are the traffic.
Kate Read Camperdown
In the future we could all be driving diesel or diesel-electric hybrid cars. This is why some of the major oil companies are putting millions of dollars into perfecting the growth of algae from which biodiesel can be extracted.
What is our Government doing about this cutting-edge technology? Judging by this month's budget, nothing. We have the CO2 (from wellhead natural gas), sunshine, land area and scientists to research and apply this technology at sites such as the north-west shelf in Western Australia.
The technology does not require good agricultural land or irrigation water, and uses up some CO2. If the Government committed to its development, we could have another export industry to rival the minerals boom, and Australia would be self-sufficient in diesel fuel.
Ian Nicholls Baulkham Hills
No one seems to have done their sums on fuel-price relief. The average car travels 25,000 kilometres a year, using about 3000 litres of fuel. A cut of five cents a litre saves $150 a year. Do Brendan Nelson and Kevin Rudd honestly believe this is going to make a difference to hard-pressed families?
Bruce Ryan Armidale
Reducing the price of petrol by a few cents a litre will release more cash into the economy and put more pressure on the Reserve Bank to raise interest rates. That puts more pressure on "working families", who are the ones most likely to be struggling with large home loans.
Robert Rochlin Riverview
Brendan Nelson claims the Coalition stands for lower petrol prices. According to the oil economist Mamdouh Salameh, who advises the World Bank and United Nations Industrial Development Organisation, the invasion of Iraq has trebled the oil price. Maybe Dr Nelson can equate this claim with Coalition policy.
Ian Ford Northbridge